Tag Archives: cooking

Michael Ruhlman: Why Cook?

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ruhlman headshot Michael Ruhlman: Why Cook?

Michael Ruhlman started a meme a couple of weeks ago where he asked people to blog about why they cook. Above is his TEDxCLE talk about why cooking is essential to making us human, to making us families, and to making us reasonably healthy human beings. It’s well worth the fifteen minutes (and he’s sort of adorably nervous, as one would be).

He says in the video, and on the follow up post on his blog, that we need to make cooking an imperative. With which I agree. But I guess one of the things I’ve been trying to figure out by writing about it (the only way I ever figure anything out) is why we need to make cooking anything. How did we get to this place where cooking, and I’m not talking elaborate, or slow food, or gourmet, or any of those things, I’m just talking about the simple act of cooking our meals on a regular basis has become so strange? Where cooking for yourself and your family has become the exception, not the rule?

I cook because it would be weird not to. I cook because it’s cheaper to cook for myself than to eat out. I cook because I like food I can’t get here in Montana (the nori roll I ate for lunch, Thai curry, good pizza). I cook because my parents cooked (although my grandmother hated cooking, and we lived on Hostess cakes at her house — they came sanitarily wrapped, an important thing in her kitchen). I cook because I believe that sharing a meal with the person I love is one of the ways we build a life together. I cook because I like to, and because it’s fun, and because I find it creative and a good way to wind down of an evening. But mostly, I cook because it would be just downright weird not to cook. Not cooking would be like letting someone else breathe for me.

So readers, why do you cook — or for those of you who don’t, why don’t you?

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New CookBookSlut Column

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Psilakis 150x150 New CookBookSlut Column

My new cookbook slut column is up at Bookslut:

Greece is the Word.

It’s been a delightful month of lemon and garlic and lamb around here. Several new recipes/techniques going into regular rotation from How to Roast a Lamb: New Greek Classic Cooking by Michael Psilakis, Vefa’s Kitchen by Vefa Alexandiou, and Michael Symon’s Live to Cook: Recipes and Techniques to Rock Your Kitchen.

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Clear Stock: With Thanks to Michael Ruhlman

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IMG 02132 300x225 Clear Stock: With Thanks to Michael Ruhlman

clarified beef stock

We’ve been cleaning out the freezers to make room for some incoming elk and lamb, and we found several packages of  “soup bones.” They were far too meaty for the dogs, so I made a batch of stock.

First I roasted them all off in a hot oven with three or four onions cut in half, and half a dozen carrots until everything was nicely carmelized. I was thrilled to discover the tail in the treasure trove as well (when it’s wrapped in butcher paper, it’s sometimes a surprise when you unwrap it). After everything browned up, I put it in my biggest stockpot, brought it to the barest of simmers, and left it overnight. Then I cooled it, skimmed off the hard beef fat that had congeled on top, and strained out the vegetables and meat (veggies went to the chickens, and the meat got stripped off the bones and added to the dog food).

Now here’s where the “thanks to Michael Ruhlman” part comes in. I’ve been making stock my entire adult life. It’s why I always spent a little more for organic chickens, because I was planning to get whatever I could out of them, and over the years I’d tried a lot of methods for straining out the grungy bits — cheesecloth, strainers, coffee filters — but I never wound up with a really nice clear stock.

This is where Ratio: The Simple Codes Behind the Craft of Everyday Cooking comes in. Ruhlman has a really clear description of how to make a raft with egg whites to clarify stock. Actually, he describes how to enrich stock with additional mirepoix and ground meat to make a consomme, which isn’t really what I needed to do. I just wanted a nice clear stock that I could pressure can and store in the pantry.

And since eggs are plentiful around here, I separated six egg whites out following Ruhlman’s instructions, added them to the cool stock, and brought the whole thing up to a simmer. This is when the egg whites start to coagulate, and form a sort of mat across the top of the pot. Basically, they act as a filter. The stock simmered for an hour, while the egg whites filtered out all those little gritty bits. As you can imagine, not pretty, but effective. And easy! For some reason I thought making a raft was going to be difficult — but it’s not. It requires some attention and stirring while the stock comes to temperature so the egg whites don’t scorch on the bottom of the pot. But aside from that, once the raft forms, you leave it at a gentle simmer, and it does it’s thing. After an hour, I removed the raft (which I fed to the chickens), and underneath was a lovely clear amber-colored stock. There was more than I wanted, so I boiled it down for about an hour until it was two-thirds in volume of what it had been. In the meantime, I got out the pressure canner, sterilized some pint jars, and prepared to can the stock.

IMG 0221 150x150 Clear Stock: With Thanks to Michael Ruhlman Here’s what I wound up with — six pints (well seven, but I ran out of new lids, so one pint is in the fridge) of clear, lovely beef stock, that’s shelf-stable and can go in my pantry.

I also wound up with some goodies for the chickens, and for the dogs.

Now, this is one of those projects that’s really easy if you work at home. Not everyone has the time, but if you do, and you have the kind of schedule that allows you to hang around the house while occasionally taking a break to perform the next step, then this is really pretty easy.

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Mmm. Meat.

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We were lucky enough to be the recipients of several large roasts that came from a tiny herd of cattle that one of Chuck’s friends raises. Last year, we had a roast beef from one of their steers, and it was the best piece of meat I think I’ve ever eaten. There really is something about meat that hasn’t seen the inside of a feedlot.

So, yesterday, being grey and rainy and full of football and all, I cooked a five pound chuck roast. While it was searing the house filled up with this amazing beefy smell. I don’t think I’m just projecting here, but I could be I suppose. Anyhow, it was marvelous.

I seared it on all sides with salt, pepper and a generous sprinkling of aleppo pepper. Then I took it out, and added three onions, sliced, and sauteed those until they were all soft and turning golden. Back in with the meat, and two half-bottles of good beer that had been languishing in the back of the fridge. I put it in a 250 oven all day, basically. A couple of hours before serving, I added a can of Herdez Ranchera sauce — my favorite dark red salsa for a little depth of flavor. Served with mashed potatoes and some sauteed spinach for me, well, it was lovely.

Although now I have about 3 pounds of leftover pot roast. I think there’s a pot roast lasagne in our future. Then maybe soup.

We eat meat nearly every night around here, but I have to say, we don’t eat huge portions, and the vast majority of the meat we eat is sourced from local ranchers. I’m less concerned about whether it’s “organic” than whether it came out of a small operation, especially since the organic regulations are such a pain a lot of organic farmers I know stopped getting certified. But it’s really worth it to find a place to buy meat by the share if you can. It’s an adventure all around — you’ll learn to cook cuts you didn’t think you liked, you’ll eat better quality meat, and you’ll make a stand against a big agriculture industry that really doesn’t care about poisoning us all with bacteria and antibiotics and other scary things.

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Frugal Recipe of the Week: Buffalo Meatballs

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I made a batch of meatballs the other day which were delicious, but interestingly enough, also stretched just under two pounds of meat into at least four meals if not six. I’m looking at a lot of cookbooks right now for BookSlut, and this recipe is very loosely adapted from the one in the A16 cookbook.

I used buffalo because it’s readily available here, and because this story in the New York Times (and this one about how Costco actually tests for E. Coli) only amped up my deep suspicion of all ground beef, even when I know the butchers at my supermarket have ground it themselves. Buffalo is more local, and even though it was more expensive, I just felt better about it. Plus, I didn’t need very much.

  • .75 pound buffalo (or a pound, I split a 1.5 pound package in half)
  • 1 pound ground pork
  • 2 ounces pancetta, diced very fine (or chopped in the food processor)
  • 3 eggs
  • 1/2 cup ricotta (I used the end of a container of Greek yogurt instead because that’s what I had on hand)
  • 6 ounces bread (about half a baguette), reduced to crumbs in a food processor
  • 2 ounces shredded parmesan or asiago cheese
  • 1/2 cup milk
  • 1/2 onion, diced finely
  • 1-2 cloves garlic, chopped fine
  • 1 tbsp. fennel seeds
  • 1 tsp. oregano
  • 1 tsp. red pepper flakes
  • 3 tbsp. finely chopped parsley

First,  beat the eggs, milk and ricotta until just incorporated. Add all the other ingredients to a big bowl, add the egg mixture, and mix thoroughly with your hands. You don’t want the mixture to become gummy, but you want an even distribution of ingredients.

Using a soup spoon or a small scoop, roll out golf-ball sized meatballs. Put them on sheet pans and bake at 400 degrees for 15 to 20 minutes. After you’ve baked them off, this is where you decide what you’re eating tonight, and what you’re saving for later. I figured 4 meatballs for each of us, which was plenty. The rest I put on one sheet pan and popped into the freezer. The next day they can be put in ziploc bags.

For the meatballs you plan to eat tonight. Put them in a casserole dish, and cover with tomato sauce. Cover the casserole tightly with foil and bake at 300 degrees for 30-40 minutes. Serve over lots of spaghetti with more cheese on top. (Preferably while watching baseball playoffs!)

Although I haven’t experimented with it yet, I imagine you could pop frozen meatballs into the casserole when you come home from work, cover with tomato sauce and cook for probably an hour and you’d have an easy mid-week dinner.

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Lasagne!

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IMG 0186 300x225 Lasagne!

Lasagne!

Hi folks — the heat finally broke and since my sweetheart has been longing for a Lasagne! for a while, and since yesterday I had a big pot of brand spanking new tomato sauce on the stove, I took a flyer at it.

This lovely lasagne was brought to you not by any of the many authentic Italian cookbooks I have on my shelf, not by Mario or Marcella or even Patricia Wells (Trattoria), or even by my beloved Dom DeLuise (Eat This .. It’ll Make You Feel Better). No, this gorgeous, gooey, wavy lasagne that is all brown on top — this lasagne was brought to you by the recipe on the back of the Barilla Lasagne noodle box.

Yes folks, here is another recipe like the Toll House Cookie recipe. One you’ll never have to remember because there it is, right on the back of the box. I did fiddle with it a little bit — I added some finely chopped parsley, oregano and basil from the garden to the egg-ricotta-cheese filling mixture. But that was it. I just followed the recipe.

The other thing you need to know about this fabulous recipe, is that it’s specifically designed for noodles you don’t cook beforehand. I was skeptical, I must admit. I thought it would be weird, or leathery, or just bad. But this is a great recipe. Easy. Delicious. Infinitely variable.

And it makes a lasagne so yummy that your sweetheart will come up and kiss you, and thank you for making lasagne, and eat another hefty portion for breakfast the next day, and leave for a day of work a happy man. Good all around. Lasagne!

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Beautiful Bread

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pb140025 150x150 Beautiful Bread I made a really gorgeous no-knead bread this week. Even with my crummy point-and-shoot camera, you can see the tiny bubbles along the surface of the crust. This bread not only sprung up like you see, but the entire crust was shattery when it came out of the oven.

This one took two days. It’s been so cold, and I’m such a miser, that my house has been hovering between 57 and 62 all week. I mixed up the regular old no-knead recipe in the middle of the day Monday. Three cups flour (I use half bread flour, half all-purpose, King Arthur only), 1/4 teaspoon yeast, 1 tablespoon salt, and enough water to make a wet shaggy dough. The next morning, it hadn’t really risen much, so I moved the bowl to the living room, in the vicinity of the heater. By evening it had risen, but I didn’t have the energy to deal with it after another crazy day at my real job, so I left it until morning.

The next morning I dumped it out, kneaded it a little bit, just because it seemed sort of stiff. Once it felt all warm and elastic, I shaped it into a nice tight boule, dusted it with some flour, and put it aside to rise.

Again, nothing happened. Too cold in my house, and the surface of the dough started to dry out and toughen up. Back to the corner of the living room side table where it was a little warmer, and I tucked a clean damp cloth napkin around it so the skin would soften up a little. By mid-afternoon it had risen to the point where if you poked it, a dimple remained, usually my marker that it’s time to bake.

So I heated the oven to 425, put my big Le Crueset in to heat up, slashed an x in the top of the bread. When the oven and the pot were hot, I put the dough in, and sprinkled a little water in to make steam.

It was a gorgeous loaf. It really sprang up, the crust was wonderful, and the crumb was very elastic and stretchy. I think it was the long slow cold fermentation that made this one so good. I’ve been making this bread for what, three years now, and one thing I love is that it changes a little bit every time. Sometimes it’s ordinary, and sometimes, it’s just beautiful. Like this one.

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Cooking in Clay

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pb050027 150x150 Cooking in Clay Cooking in clay is one of those things that you read about in cookbooks and wonder what the fuss is all about — or at least I did, until my mother gave me this funny little pot one year for Christmas. I have no idea where she found it, it was an odd gift, even for her. For the first few years I had it, I assumed you could only use it in the oven. It wasn’t until I was at a party during one of the Squaw Valley Writers workshops and saw Barbara Hall using hers on her stove that I realized you could do that. She told me she’s had hers for decades, and they only get better the more you cook with them.

I have to say, she was right. I’ve come to love this pot, and it’s sibling, the larger bean pot I found at a garage sale. For beans, there’s nothing better, it imparts this subtle, wonderful clay-y aroma to the beans. I know, doesn’t sound appealing, but believe me, it’s terrific.

This weekend I cooked up a batch of black beans. I like having a quart of beans in the fridge — they’re so handy. A few tablespoons in a tortilla with some leftover rice for lunch, or heated up in a pot then pureed for a quick soup, or again, a spoonful or two added to scrambled eggs for an easy easy dinner. And on a weekend, a pot of beans simmering away on the back of the stove in my old clay pot, makes the house smell like home.

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School Lunch, Opportunity for Change?

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There’s a vigorous and healthy debate going on in the blogosphere about school lunch. Congress is gearing up to revise the Child Nutrition and WIC act, which includes the school lunch program, and the forces of Hope and Change have ideas. (Click through to the actual essays linked, my summaries necessarily oversimplify.)

Alice Waters started the debate on the NY Times Op-Ed page, advocating that we double the lunch subsidy from $2.17 to $5.00. She also, no surprise, wants a program that works with farmers to get organic local produce into schools, and advocates rebuilding school kitchens.

This suggestion, particularly the price tag, has set off something of a storm. There’s a new-ish blog called the Internet Food Association, which seems to be a bunch of policy wonks who are also interested in food, and who are cross-pollinating the argument by bringing economics and policy experience into the debate. Tom Lee takes on Alice’s argument, and in particular, her price point, here in a piece entitled The Pretentious is the Enemy of the Good. Ezra Klein, writing on the same blog, has a slightly different take, one that I think includes my favorite quote:

Cooking is more useful than dodgeball proficiency — particularly as you get older. But schools have dodgeball courts. I cook more often than I play the clarinet. But my school had a music room. We have to decide whether it’s worth the expenditure, but integrating kitchens into schools is not crazy on its face.

Tom Philpott, over at Grist, does a good summation of the argument. He’s curious, as am I, about why the mere suggestion that we spend five bucks on lunch for kids gets people so riled up. And it’s Philpott who keeps floating my favorite suggestion — a program for endebted cooking school grads based on Teach for America — trade the enthusiasm and skill of newly trained chefs for some debt relief and the opportunity to demonstrate that they can run a good kitchen on a budget.

What’s my take? I live in a small town. We have two elementary schools (one that shares a building with the middle school) and a high school. We have a population of people who could easily work in school lunchrooms, competantly making lunch every day. We still have a pretty low unemployment rate, but a lot of people are in extremely low-wage jobs and would be happy to trade up for a nice safe school district job, especially if we could find a way to provide insurance. I also live in an area where there is an easy supply of local meat (including game in the fall) and where agricultural education is already part of the curriculum. It would not be a big stretch to get kids throughout our entire district involved in the production end of the food system, many of them already are (or have extended family who are ranchers).

If we had real kitchens in schools again, and gardens, and some vibrant connection to the ranching community in which we live, we could build a curriculum around food that would teach all sorts of useful skills. Cooking for one, which as anyone who has read this blog for more than five minutes realizes is a big cause for me. Cooking with kids is a proven way to get them to expand their food preferences, and you learn a lot of school skills when you cook. Math and measurement and ratios and temperatures –what is cooking but one big science experiment? Get kids in the kitchen, let them help figure out budgets and decide what to cook for their schoolmates. Have them write recipes and menus and “advertise” their lunch day in the school paper. Get high school kids in the kitchen as interns — we’re not a district where it’s assumed everyone is going to college — give a kid a chance to learn a useful skill.

I don’t know, I don’t see any downside except that this means being more involved. I cannot see any upside to feeding our kids the crap we’re currently feeding them. And frankly, if we’re going to stimulate some areas of the economy, why not stimulate farmers and cooks and teachers and people who want to be passionately involved rather than stimulating the big food processors and delivery companies who think that battered chicken shards formed in patties are an actual food product?

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